The Return Journey by Maeve Binchy

Author:Maeve Binchy
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub, pdf
Tags: Europe, General, Literary, Ireland, Fiction, Short Stories, History
ISBN: 9780385341790
Publisher: Dell
Published: 1998-01-02T06:00:00+00:00

in Ireland, for heaven’s sake. They were very

disapproving. They were not people who wrote

letters much or made cross-Channel phone

calls. But they disapproved nonetheless. Heav-

ily.

And when John and Mary got engaged, they

assumed that it was a shotgun marriage, which

it wasn’t, and that it would be in a Roman

Catholic Church full of images of saints and

the Virgin, which it was. And they said they

couldn’t come to the wedding.

Mary sent pictures of the children, Jacinta,

now eight, and John Paul, who was born the

day the Pope came to Ireland and was seven.

Looking back on it, Mary wondered if she

132

THE CROSSING

should have chosen different names for the

children. But surely that wasn’t important.

John’s parents could hardly disapprove of a

child’s name as being from a different tribe.

And Mary had been careful to send pictures

of the children at Christmas rather than the

First Communion snapshot that she felt the

instinct to send each time.

Lavender was full of praise. Mary had done

more than her share. And where was the prob-

lem?

It wasn’t exactly a problem; there was no

out-and-out war, just a distance in every sense

of the word. And a dread of meeting these

people, who wouldn’t come to Ireland, who

had never shown any greater interest than a

dutiful card at Christmastime. Mary was not

looking forward to hearing what a brilliant

career had been cut short when John had met

her in Ireland ten long years ago.

She didn’t want to make excuses for the life

they led in a small country town where John

worked happily on a farm and Mary was a

dressmaker.

And they were going now because John’s

father was unemployed, had been for a year,

and the word had trickled back from a woman

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THE RETURN JOURNEY

neighbor that John’s dad was taking it hard.

Mary had suggested they visit Ireland and as

usual it had been turned down, so, gritting

her teeth, she had then suggested that they

take the children to visit their grandparents,

and this had been agreed to. Ungraciously, of

course. “You’ll have to take us as you fi nd us.”

But still agreed.

It was a two-week visit. Too long, Mary

thought, but it was a huge undertaking, four

of them to go to London; it would be a great

waste to go for less time.

Lavender said that Mary was a positive gem

among women. She said she was sure that the

parents-in-law would be so pleased that in a

few days they would all wonder whether the

distance could possibly have been in their

imaginations.

“Would you like a little advice?” she asked,

almost shyly.

“Oh, I’d love anything you could tell me,

you being English and a bit older, not that

you’d be as old as them or anything, but you

know…”

Lavender leaned her back against the rail,

squinted into the sun, and talked not directly

to Mary but as if she was speaking to herself.

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THE CROSSING

She looked very much like a woman who

should be on a luxury cruise liner waiting for

an executive husband to come back from a

game of deck tennis with the captain.

“I wouldn’t apologize or explain too much.

Maybe let them think they were part of your

lives, even though they weren’t. The children

should know a bit about them, like their birth-

days and their names, and where they grew up

themselves.

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